MEPA set to green-light heavy fuel oil till 2014

The Malta Environment and Planning Authority board will tomorrow be deciding on whether to postpone any decision on the continued use of heavy fuel oil (HFO) at the Delimara power station up until March 2014.

The current Integrated Pollution Prevention and Control (IPPC) permit issued under the previous administration allowed Enemalta to continue using HFO up until 30 June 2013 in the interim.

The MEPA board must decide on whether to extend Enemalta's permission to use HFO.

An independent report on the concentration of pollution in the southern villages resulting from the burning of HFO has not yet been finalised. MEPA claims this is down to a delay in the commissioning of the engines for the Delimara phase two extension.

The BWSC-constructed power station can use both the cheap but polluting HFO, as well as the more expensive but cleaner gasoil diesel to operate. The plant can also be converted to natural gas, but at a considerable expense.

Labour, elected on a platform to convert the power station to run on natural gas, back in 2011 stated that the Delimara extension should immediately shift to gasoil diesel before being converted to natural gas.

On that occasion Labour said it was "reiterating its electoral promise that a new Labour government would immediately commence the process to convert the Delimara plant firstly to use gasoil and subsequently gas."

But this commitment was not included in the party's general election manifesto, even though it described the Delimara plant as a "factory for cancer and asthma".

Immediately after being elected to power, the new Labour government announced that the use of HFO would continue up until the conversion to natural gas is completed, in the shortest time possible.

Last April, MaltaToday asked Energy Minister Konrad Mizzi whether the new government intended to convert the existing Delimara plant to diesel. A spokesperson replied simply: "The government's policy is to switch from heavy fuel oil to gas in the short term."

The current IPPC permit's conditions stipulate that Delimara's monitoring committee - a panel composed of Enemalta officials and local council representatives - analyse emissions data gathered over the first six months of the year, for a decision that was to be taken on 30 June 2013.

The committee is still awaiting an independent report by the Air Quality Management Resource Centre of the University of the West of England, Bristol.

But a preliminary baseline report prepared by the same company, based on monitoring results between 2009 and 2012, concluded that "no conclusive evidence" existed of emissions from the Delimara power station contributing to pollution concentrations in Marsaxlokk, Birzebbugia or neighbouring towns. Traffic, it found, was a more likely source of air pollution.

MEPA said its own recommendation to postpone the decision was reached in agreement with the monitoring committee.